154 Mr. J. H. Balfour Browne [June 1, 



— love," and from her own intellectual point of view, she added there 

 are " substantial heart-felt interests for women of all ages in ordinary 

 circumstances, quite apart from love." 



That is quite true, but quite irrelevant. It shows only that she 

 did not understand Charlotte Bronte. In answer to it Charlotte 

 wrote : " I know Avhat love is, as I understand it, and if man or 

 woman should be ashamed of feeling such love, then there is nothing 

 right, noble, faithful, truthful, unselfish, in this earth, as I compre- 

 hend rectitude, nobleness, fidelity, truth and disinterestedness." 



It is this knowing " what love is " that has made her books great, 

 and has left her with an unsullied reputation — notwithstanding her 

 martyrdom for love's sake — for rectitude, nobleness, fidelity, truth 

 and disinterestedness, which has enhanced the w^orld's opinion of 

 womanhood. 



Now although, as I have said, we ought from her veritable books 

 to have been in no doubt as to the turning-point in Charlotte 

 Bronte's life, there is one mystery to be cleared up, and that is, how 

 a competent critic and careful student like Mr. Clement Shorter^ 

 whose " Bronte" books are as a whole valuable contributions to literary 

 history, should have been betrayed into such a mistake as to Charlotte 

 Bronte's real spiritual relations to M. Heger. In his books he had 

 erroneously, I think, and in the teeth of the evidence and Sir 

 Wemyss Reid's summing up of it, taken up this position — that 

 Charlotte Bronte had admired M. Heger as a master, and respected 

 him as a man of genius, and that such an attitude was quite natural 

 in a woman situated as she was. Even then it struck one that the 

 writer did not know the difference between the passion of love — as 

 Charlotte "knew it"— and the literary toady's lukewarm respect. 

 The temperature of these two is very different when tested even by a 

 not very sensitive thermometer. 



It was love that was written large over her books, and not book 

 love, but heart love. What must one make of Charlotte's own state- 

 ment that " she returned to Bi'ussels against her conscience, prompted 

 by an irresistible impulse, and so lost peace and happiness for two 

 years " ? Is this the respect one feels for a good teacher, or the sorrow- 

 one suffers from missing his lectures from the estrade ? But again, 

 wdiat was the meaning of her confession in St. Gudule ? AVhat had 

 the poor, spotless governess to confess except her love ? It is of this 

 confession she wrote to Emily as " a real confession." " Better not 

 tell papa," she wrote, " he will not understand it was only a freak, 

 and will, j)erhaps, think I am going to turn Catholic." Not under- 

 stand it ? No one could, unless he had the key to her heart. It 

 was not a freak, it was a "real confession." But not content with 

 the ear of the priest, she has confessed herself with more truth than 

 the sanction of an oath ever gives in "Yillette." "Lucy Snowe 

 w^aited, and hoped and w^aited, but Paul Emanuel never came back." 

 Her father wanted her to make a happy ending to the book, but 



